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Nun investigated over hand in millionaire's will

Tom Kington

A nun in Italy is under investigation after a wealthy benefactor left everything to her convent.

ROME: A lonely Italian millionaire who befriended the mother superior from her local convent believed she had found a companion in her dying days.

Now police are investigating the possibility that the nun - who offered the woman prayers and comfort - was more interested in the dying woman's money and forged her will to help herself after she died.

Sister Angela Gramegna is being investigated by police on suspicion of fraudulently pocketing €1.5 million ($1.9 million) and getting the keys to an apartment in an upmarket neighbourhood in Rome. Investigators have seized the apartment and placed Sister Gramegna under investigation after calligraphy experts decided she wrote and signed the will in which her apparent benefactor, Francesca Di Cesare, left everything she owned to the convent.

Illustration: Cathy Wilcox

Alone with no living relatives in Trieste, a leafy neighbourhood in north-east Rome, Ms Di Cesare turned to the nuns of the order of the Ancelle Sacro Cuore for support before she died in 2007, even moving into their convent for the last days of her life.

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The porter at Ms Di Cesare's building grew suspicious when a contingent of nuns from the convent began arriving to empty her flat of objects, documents and clothes just before she died.

When her will was opened, neighbours and a childhood friend were surprised to read Ms Di Cesare's description of the nuns as ''my family, to whom I have decided to leave everything'', meaning €484,000 ($608,000) in cash, €1 million ($1.25 million) in bonds and the apartment itself.

Ms Di Cesare's neighbours then noticed the will's handwriting looked nothing like hers and experts called in by investigators decided the document had been entirely written by Sister Gramegna, who has since transferred to a convent in Naples.

Police moved in to seize the Rome apartment after the neighbours recently reported a steady flow of estate agents visiting.